


Walk On the Ocean

by Pearl_Pilots_In_Chains



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, I managed to make a beach angsty, Inspired by Music, It has a happyish ending, Possibly AU, Possibly Post-Canon, Songfic to some extent, Trip to the Beach, i guess?, yay me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-19
Updated: 2020-04-19
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:06:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23731306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pearl_Pilots_In_Chains/pseuds/Pearl_Pilots_In_Chains
Summary: Ed and Winry go for a walk on the beach.  Sounds simple and straightforward, right?  Sure, definitely . . .
Relationships: Edward Elric/Winry Rockbell
Comments: 6
Kudos: 23





	Walk On the Ocean

**Author's Note:**

> This is a songfic, in that it's inspired by, and includes references (with varying degrees of subtlety) to a number of Toad the Wet Sprocket songs. Chief among these is the titular "Walk on the Ocean," which I would honestly recommend as a soundtrack for at least the beginning of the fic, if you're the type of person who enjoys mixing music and reading. Or you could just enjoy it in awkward silence, and really put yourself in the characters' shoes. Err, sandals. Eh, whatever. *shrugs*
> 
> As usual, I apologize in advance for any grammatical/typographical errors. They'll probably keep happening, so I'll probably keep apologizing. It's a vicious cycle of being too lazy to proofread, and feeling guilty for not proofreading. Aww yeah, writer problems!
> 
> You know, these notes are kinda dragging on . . . anyway, here's the fic:

The cream-tone sand crunched under Ed’s feet as he allowed his bare soles to press into the ground, setting his sandals on the stones next to him.Rising from his position seated on the log, he looked out through the gaps in the trees, down to the beach below.The evening sunset had begun to ignite the sky, sending streaks of fuchsia and crimson across the firmament, a brilliant abstract canvas pasted across the horizon.He was glad they had decided to come in the evening.Things were stiller now, the crowds of the day diminished.The pines that framed the view were the only company he could see, and he was perfectly alright with that.They were calm, quiet companions, ancient lords of earth and sky at rest in an interminable slumber.There was something comforting about their immensity, their grandeur.It spoke of endurance and the immutable, even as the shifting tides and ever-tossed and churned sands of the beach below them spoke of relentless, inevitable change.

Ed’s philosophical revery on the nature of the landscape was interrupted by Winry’s voice, calling to him from next to the set of rough-hewn steps that arched down the forested hillside to the beach below.“So, are we going to go down to the beach, or did we just come here for you to sit on a log and look out at the sea?”Her tone was teasing, but there was no bite to it.She waved from her position, trying to break his trancelike state through physical motion.

Ed turned to look at his wife, tearing his thoughts and gaze away from the existential ocean.“Oh.”He mumbled dumbly.Winry raised an eyebrow and stared at him incredulously, not looking at all impressed by the less-than coherent response.

“You do realize that’s not a word, right?I was kind of looking for an actual coherent response.”Winry chided him playfully.

Ed grinned, his cheeks flushing slightly.“Alright, alright.I’m coming.There, is that coherent enough?”

Winry pursed her lips wryly and shook her head in mock disappointment.“Well, I guess it will have to do for now.Anyway, I’m going down,” she tilted her head toward the lower beach, “So, you can either come along, or be left all by your lonesome.”

“Hey,” Ed protested with a chuckle, “I’d still have the trees.They’re quality company!”

“You know, on second thought, I don’t think I can leave you alone.”Winry strode over, assuming a determined expression.“Your sanity’s at stake, and if your sanity’s at stake, then so is mine!And I’m not about to put up with that.”She grabbed Ed’s hand and pulled him after her as she headed down the stairs.He followed along without too much resistance, grumbling in mock annoyance.

“I think I’m more than capable of walking on my own!”

“Says the man who wants to let his wife go down to the shore alone while he talks to a couple spruces and a cypress!”

“I mean . . . I’m pretty sure these are bishop pines—“ Winry tugged forcibly on Ed, making him stumble as they reach the base of the stairs.“Ahh!”She showed no signs of relinquishing her grip.

“I could drown you know!It could happen!And you’d still be there, rambling to a pinecone!What do you have to say about that?”Her eyes narrowed as she turned to regard Ed, looking positively mischievous, still progressing forward out onto the beach.

“Ummm . . . I’m sorry?,”Ed replied hesitantly.“Can I have my arm back now?We made it to the beach.”

“Hmmph,” Winry snorted in false indignation.“Damn right.Fine, I suppose you can have it back.”She released his arm from her vice, letting it drop to his side.Immediately, he began to rub it and twist it about, returning it to a mostly normal condition.He had to admit, Winry had a respectably strong clasp when it came down to it.Then again, being a mechanic wasn’t exactly a desk job.It took some serious exertion at times.

“You know, you’d have lost a couple precious things if I had drowned,” Winry remarked softly, her voice holding an air of unspoken suggestion.Ed, however, was only partially listening, fairly preoccupied with his self-ministrations to his now-sore arm.He looked up, moderately confused, having only half-heard and processed her statement.

“What was that?,”He asked, puzzled.

Winry rolled her eyes and looked away, shifting her attention to survey the gentle rippling waves that lapped at the edge of the sandy expanse.“Oh, it was nothing,” she answered, a sparkly smile in her voice.

Ed furrowed his brow.It certainly didn’t seem like nothing, but he wasn’t about to invoke his partner’s affectionate ire again by pressing the point.He didn’t to add any other limbs to the list of body parts that felt his they had been wrung out.“Okaayyyy.So . . . is it everything you thought it would be?”

Winry looked back at her husband.“Is what everything I thought it would be?”

Ed scratched the back of his head.“You know.The beach.”He shrugged, opening his palms as though he was offering the statement up for consideration.

Winry regarded him skeptically.“You do realize I’ve been to the beach before, right?This isn’t my first time.”

“Well yeah, I know.”Ed continued lamely, trying to defend his question, “I just meant, is it how you thought it would be this time?”

Winry covered her mouth to hide her grin.“Uh huh.Keep on backpedaling there, why don’t you?”

“Hey, you don’t know if I was backpedaling or not!,” Edward objected, pretending as though he was deeply offended by the comment.

Winry’s eyebrows danced.Ed couldn’t help but think it was incredibly adorable every time she bounced them as she did now, even if it usually heralded a snarky declaration.Adding onto her facial display, she jabbed a finger into Ed’s stomach accusingly, “Edward Elric, I have known you since you were crawling.I know when you’re backpedaling.And you should know, that your BS rebuttal doesn’t placate me for an instant!”

Ed giggled in spite of himself as Winry withdrew her assaulting digit.“I don’t think that knowing me when I was a baby would help you tell when I’m backpedaling.And to be fair, you were crawling too!And on top of that—”

Winry twisted her lips into a tight, mildly threatening frown that signaled to Ed it was a good time to shut his mouth.He did so, halting in the middle of his sentence, leaving his mouth hanging open idiotically.He snapped it shut after a moment, but it was long enough for Winry’s frown to change to a triumphant smirk.“Uh huh,” she intoned, “That’s right.Just like that.”

It was now Ed’s turn to roll his eyes, running his hand through his hair.“You’re the worst sometimes, you know that, right?”

Winry reached out to brush Ed’s shoulder.“I guess we deserve each other then, huh?”She said, adopting a cloying tone that practically oozed stereotypical romance.

Ed was uncertain what to make of the sudden change.“Ummm . . . yeah, I guess so.”

“Yep!,”Winry pronounced as she stabbed her finger into Ed’s shoulder, her voice returning to a more recognizable timbre.Ed winced, though it wasn’t particularly painful.In all fairness, he should have seen the trick coming.Winry spun her head back to face forward and began to stroll along the auburn-illuminated beach.Ed couldn’t deny, she was beautiful, especially in this setting, the dying embers of the day reflecting on the sounds about her and clothing her in a radiant russet sheen.Her golden, rolling hair almost looked ginger in the light that played about it.He set off after her down the beach, smiling to himself.

Winry wheeled about to face Ed after they had wandered a short distance down the beach.“This looks like a good spot.”

Ed paused, looking a bit confused.“A good spot for what?”

Winry, however, didn’t answer.Instead, she sat down on the ground and began to unclasp her sandals.She briefly glanced over at Ed.“I want to go wading.”

Ed looked out toward the sea for a moment.It appeared as though the tide was beginning to pull away from the shoreline, leaving a border of shallow water along its receding edge.“Oh, okay.”He nodded in understanding. 

By now, Winry had finished removing her footwear.She froze momentarily, matching Ed’s oceanic vigil.Together, they watched the gradually retreating water in mutual silence.When she at last spoke again, her tone had changed to a softer, more reserved one, that sounded practically remorseful to Ed.“I get if you don’t want to.I know that it’s kind of childish.”

Ed hesitantly reacted, “I don’t think that’s childish or anything.I don’t mind.”He lowered himself down to sit next to Winry, a little surprised by her new attitude.He didn’t know quite what to make of her sudden discomfiture.It was abnormal, to say the least.He continued, hoping to reassure her, but still feeling a nascent uneasiness himself, “Seriously, I really don’t.”

Winry creased her brow as she regarded her husband.“Wow, you totally seem confident about that,” she drawled, her voice acidulous.

This only served to further disquiet Ed, but he did his best to steel himself and reaffirm his previous statements in a firmer manner.“I promise, I don’t think it’s childish.I mean that.”

Winry refocused her attention once more on the slowly darkening waters.She didn’t respond to Ed’s reiteration.He decided to hazard a question.Sliding out a hand tentatively to brush hers, he inquired, “Why would you think I would think it’s childish?”

Winry didn’t answer verbally immediately, only shrugging lightly.She did, however, let Ed slip his fingers between hers, intertwining the digits on the sand between the two of them.Ed decided that this was more of a positive sign than a negative one, since Winry wouldn’t normally tolerate any physical contact whatsoever past a certain level of agitation.After another stretch of silence that Ed realized probably felt longer than it must have truly been, because it felt like a near eternity, she spoke again, another change apparent in her voice, which was now reflective and distant and bittersweet.“There was a song.That my father would sing to me. . . before the war.Before my parents . . .” She trailed off.Ed squeezed her hand, and was about to speak, but she beat him to the action, “I was so little.I hardly remember it now. . .only bits and pieces.But there’s one part that’s still clear.It was a line about walking on the ocean.I know I loved that part.As a kid, I didn’t realize, that you can’t just walk on the ocean.I mean, I eventually did.By the time I actually got to sea the ocean, I knew I couldn’t just walk on it like land.”She laughed a bit, a wrenching sort of mournful chuckle.“And I guess . . . that disappointed me, because I wanted to be able to.But wading in the shallows is as close as we can get.So, as far as I’m concerned, that will have to do.”

Ed nodded, listening intently.An idea had come to his mind, and he voiced it.“You know, it might not be quite the same, but swimming is almost like walking on the ocean too.”

Winry laughed again when she heard his statement, this time somewhat less dolefully.

Ed forehead wrinkled at the response.“What?”He asked bemusedly.

As Winry fell back into a more common quiet once more, she replied straightforwardly, “I’m not much of a swimmer.”

“Oh.Okay.”Ed shifted, looking down at the sand.With his free hand, he scooped up a miniature pile and let it drizzle gently down from between his fingers.

Winry exhaled, her gaze softening.“I mean, it’s not like we grew up close to a lake or something.Resembool’s about as landlocked as you can get.”

“Yeah, you have a point.”

Winry pulled herself up to her feet, wrenching her fingers out of Ed’s, still appearing fairly preoccupied.A subtle twinge of melancholy coursed through him at the rapid severing of contact.Winry had a way of affecting him with the slightest actions, even if she was unaware of it.She turned her eyes upward, scrutinizing the dulling ether above.Ed watched her expression carefully.Her gaze was a searching one, peremptorily questioning the clouds.“We should have come earlier,” she remarked, a tension in her voice.

Ed looked downward, back to the sand that his fingers had taken to playing with unconsciously.“Yeah, maybe so.We were busy though.These meetings are relentless.”He let loose a subdued note of laughter.Winry remained stoic, still demanding something undefined from the sky.Ed plunged onward, figuring he might as well risk it.“How’d the tour of the shop go?”

Winry’s response was monosyllabic and perfunctory, “Fine.”

Ed used his non-sand-covered hand to scratch the stubble about his cheek, a habit he had picked up over the past couple years, and generally a dead giveaway that something was stressing him.“That’s good,” he enunciated slowly.“Honestly, I was kinda afraid you’d end up being kind of bored here . . . I mean, I know diplomacy isn’t exactly thrilling.I mean, it’s not really your scene.”

Winry didn’t look at him, but she did respond to this, near-cynical in sentiment, “And what, it’s your scene?”

Ed laughed sincerely at this, despite the half-scathing tone.“Not at all.Like I said, these meetings are relentless.I’m pretty Mustang only dragged me along so he could watch me suffer.He’s sadistic like that sometimes.”This last statement was clearly meant in jest, though from all outward appearances, it failed to impress Winry.

“Maybe he just wants something to distract him from his own misery,” Winry intone dryly.

“Yeah, maybe so . . . anyway . . . I just meant, I’m glad you’ve been doing stuff.I mean, I was kinda surprised when you told me you want to come, because I wasn’t sure . . .” He trailed off as Winry interrupted him, sounding affronted.

“Why?Because I’m not allowed to want to travel sometimes too?Because you don’t think there are things I’d like to do?”

Ed realized he had erred.He hastily tried to repair the damage, getting a little louder than he intended.“No!I didn’t mean it like that!I just thought you were busy in Rush Valley.With the business and everything.But I’m glad you were able to come!I really am!”

Winry’s silence persisted.Without even being able to see her face in burnished evening, he didn’t have much hope for reading her reaction.Her posture was rigid, transfixed and consumed by her astronomical examination.“We should wade while there’s still light,” she declared evenly, betraying nothing.

Ed frowned to himself, but agreed.“Yeah, you’re right.”

Winry broke from her statuesque observation and set off toward the water’s edge purposefully.Quickly, Ed bounced to his feet and followed, his speed brisk, albeit tempered a bit by his lingering trepidation.Winry had already dipped into the shallows up to her ankles, and plodded onward as Ed approached her from behind.He felt the waters accept first his feet, and than his calves as they walked further.He was glad he had only worn breeches, rather than a full pair of trousers, which would have been thoroughly waterlogged from the knee down at this point.As it was, when the bottoms of his legwear began to dampen, he hesitated.He didn’t exactly feel like wringing out his pants later, but there wasn’t much he could do about it.He noted that Winry had paused as well, a few paces ahead of him, though he doubted her reasons were the same.She had dressed a little more appropriately for the activity they were now engaged in, _probably because she had this in mind for a while,_ Ed mused to himself.She had stripped down to a her swimsuit before they had come down to the beach proper, satisfied that the particular area was abandoned enough for her liking.Indeed, it had seemed almost too convenient that the beach was devoid of any other visitors, but Ed wasn’t about to complain.Some time with no one but Winry had sounded like an amazing respite after a week full of tedious negotiations with Cretan politicians, but it was now turning out to be considerably less than rejuvenating.Looking down at the calm waters that enveloped his lower extremities, Ed bent and swirled a bit of the liquid with a finger, watching the motion thoughtfully.There was a small splash, and he felt droplets scatter across his hair.He snapped back up, to see that Winry had crept back toward him and was now looking at him intently.Hesitantly, he opened his mouth.“What?”

Winry tilted her head, her focus undiminished.“You know, you miss a lot.When you’re always traveling.When you’re always somewhere else.”

Ed creased his forehead, dipping his neck slightly.“I do?”Realizing that might not have been the best response, he amended it uneasily.“I mean . . . yeah, I guess I do.”He paused again, an awkward lull in which Winry continued to stare at him.Her gaze could be uncannily solid at times.“Anything in particular you’re referring to?”He added, his voice uneven.

“I’m ‘referring to’ life, Ed.To everything.”She sounded indignant and unappreciative of his question.

“Yeah . . . you’re right.I kind of do.”

“Kind of?”

He looked down.“No, you’re right, I miss stuff.”

“You realize you’re gone more often than you’re home, right?”

Ed lifted his head once more, his tone growing harder.“You know, it’s not like I necessarily want to always be traveling.It’s not like it’s my idea of a great time.Mustang just enjoys busting my—“

“Bullshit!”Her eyes narrowed dangerously.“Don’t blame this on Mustang!That’s what you use every time this comes up!And you know what?I bought it.I bought it for a couple years.That is, until I actually talked to Mustang while you were off running around on one of your trips for him.And guess what I found out?That more often than not, you had the freedom to decide whether or not you wanted to be a part of the mission.That you had choices.That you could have taken assignments that would have kept you in the East or in Central.But instead, instead you always chose the ones that required you to travel!You chose the far-flung jobs.The ones that were intensive, time-consuming, full-blown affairs that kept you away for a month at a time, sometimes two.And you know what the best part is?That after you’d finally come home between trips, you’d bitch to me!You’d bitch to me about what a ‘pain in the ass’ your job was, and how Mustang was running you ragged for his own amusement!When in reality, you wanted those assignments!You took them of your own free will!And I let you complain.I let you put on your little show of being ‘homesick’ and acting like ‘absence makes the heart grow fonder.’When you knew!You knew it was all nothing but an act!”She broke off to inhale, her face a constricted mask.

Ed’s eyes returned to the water that devoured his lower limbs.His words came out terse and tighter than he wanted.“Win, it’s not what you think.I promise.Fuck, I swear it’s not like that.It’s not that I don’t want to be with you.It’s not that I don’t want to be home, be stable.Shit . . . it’s not that I don’t like it there.It’s just that, I have this urge.I have this need.To always be moving.To be doing something.”

“Oh, because of course, there’s nothing to do back in Amestris?What, is all the work suddenly finished?Is it too boring for you?Not enough excitement?Now that there’s no corrupt regime to overthrow, no conspiracy to unmask, no crisis to avert, it’s not up to your standards?Is that what this is?Your sad attempt at trying to recapture some sort of adrenaline high?”

“I don’t know, I don’t know, okay?All I know is that I can’t sit still.I can’t just do busy work.I want to do something that matters.Something that feels worthwhile.I have to keep moving.I have to keep going.It’s what I know how to do.”He raised his eyes to meet Winry’s ceaseless stare.“It’s the way I am.”

“With what you just said, it sounds a hell of a lot like I don’t matter to you, or was that just supposed to be understood?,”She spat out witheringly.

Ed felt his stance growing unstable.He rotated about, breaking off their visual link and shifting away from his wife as he collapsed inward.“That’s not what I meant, okay?”He gritted his teeth, frustration vying with fear for the position of the dominant emotion in his heart.“It’s not you, it’s not us, it’s not any of the people we care about.It’s everything that’s passed.It never disappears completely.There’s still a sick sort of shadow that hangs about.Tints a place permanently.You can’t get out the stain once its there, even if you soak a thousand times.That’s the other part of it.Sometimes the air . . . I’ll be breathing fine, and suddenly, I’ll want to choke when I think about who stood somewhere I’m standing, who breathed in the same fumes, who existed in the precise location.”

Based on her timbre when she spoke again, Winry wasn’t convinced by this, but she seemed to be listening.“So what?You’re running away from Amestris because of ghosts?Because of memories?Because you’re trying to outpace your own memories?”

Ed let the questions hang for a long while, the silence brewing thick and stagnant.The queries, spoken more like statements, rolled about in his mind, off-balance and flitting away from easy answers, easy readings.His reply was stumbling and improvised, though simultaneously authentic as a result.“I guess so . . . I don’t know.But I know I’m not trying to run away from you. . . I need you to believe that.Look, if I didn’t love you, if I was, trying to escape you, this trip would have been absolute hell.But as it is, it’s been amazing.Or at least, as close as a diplomatic mission can be to amazing.And it’s because you’ve been here.It’s never been you that makes it hard to stay in Amestris.It’s the place itself.There’s too much there.I know the land too well.”

He was confused when he heard a soft chortle from behind him.“You know, I never thought I’d see the day when someone said, ‘it’s not you, it’s my homeland.’But, I can’t deny, it’s pretty original.”

He felt his nails digging into his palms.“It’s the truth.That’s all I can say.”

“Alright, so let’s say I wholeheartedly believe that.Why have you never said anything?We could deal with it.We could work through it.Together.That’s what you do with demons.You face them.Otherwise, they chase you until you’re ragged and worn.And they devour you.You of all people should know that.I think you’ve fought plenty of demons in your life.”

Ed said nothing, but began to shamble away from Winry, padding through the shallows back toward the solid ground.His shoulders were curved, bowing his head.

“Edward Elric, don’t you dare walk away from me!Answer me, dammit!”He could hear her voice beginning to choke as she shouted.“I wanted to come out here for a fucking reason, you know!”

He set his mouth into a thin line as he found the shore, extracting himself from the water altogether.He didn’t look back.He couldn’t deal with this now.His head was beginning to burn, the thump in his chest growing louder.His ribcage was tight, heavy, cumbersome.He heard the sound of water splashing behind him, and felt the presence approaching before she arrived.A hand attempted to grab his own, but he wrenched it away, turning to the side to avoid facing Winry.She came up beside him anyway, and darted ahead to stand immediately in his path.He halted, fixing his attention firmly on the grounding, a silent refusal to acknowledge her.

“I wanted to tell you something, you know!I thought this—“ she gestured around widely to the beach, “Would be beautiful.I thought it would make everything better.Somehow, someway.That maybe it wouldn’t be so hard.Just for one night.I guess I shouldn’t have expected so much!”

“You know, if you miss me so much when I’m gone, why don’t you just come with me?”Ed asked scornfully.

“I have a life in Amestris!And I’m not about to abandon everything and everyone I love to become your traveling accessory.I have friends there!And sometimes I feel like when I’m with them, that we’re more of a family than we are when we’re together!You know, you used to have people you cared about there too!And I don’t just mean me!I mean all of us!Mustang, Hawkeye, the whole crew!Don’t you ever feel guilty about the fact that you hardly see them either?Or has your own fear made you forget you ever cared about any of us?”

Ed’s scowl grew deeper.“I still care about all of them.Never say I don’t care.”He looked up and met her eyes, his own aflame with a furious terror and a conflicted rage.“Never say I don’t care.”

“If you care, prove it.Show it.Show me I’m wrong!If you know you have a problem, if you know you’re haunted, then change!Exorcise whatever’s cursing you!If you do nothing but run once you know what you’re running for, it’s no good to even no in the first place!You’re no better off than you would be if you were completely ignorant!”

“You think I don’t want to change?You think I like this!You think I like still being sick!This shouldn’t even matter!It shouldn’t be like this!Everything should have gotten better.After we ended it.When we won.It should have gone away!”His tone grew progressively more unsteady and uncontrolled as he spoke, his eyes beginning to tear and his throat doing its very best to keep the words down.His stomach was flailing, biting creeping up toward his mouth.“I thought it would go away if I went west!So I did!And it went quiet!But when I came back, things got worse!I couldn’t stop it!I would see something, and the memories would come!I would hear something, and the memories would be there!Fuck, I’d just smell the air and they’d be there waiting!I couldn’t even walk through Central without feeling like I was buried under half a house!It felt like it was all dream.That I’d turn a corner and suddenly, there’d be a homunculus waiting for me!Do you know what that’s like?I’d want to cry sometimes, in the middle of the streets!Just fall down!Do you know what it’s like when you’re supposed to be the great hero, the one who saved the nation, the one who fought the monsters, and the hardest battle you’re left to fight is covering up the fact that your hands won’t stop shaking when you’re standing in the middle of a crowd?!Because whatever it is that you fear the most, that’s what you know you’ll see in front of you if you focus too hard!And no matter what, no matter, however perfect everything around you may be, something’s always wrong, and it’s you!”He was beginning to hyperventilate, his words broken and choppy.“It makes you feel like shit, that’s what it’s like!Like you’re nothing but a lie, nothing but a fucking lie!That’s it’s all just a costume, it’s all just a little performance you put on!Because inside, you’re still as weak as that boy crying for his brother and looking at the hell he opened up, the hell he made!And suddenly, it all feels like nothing changed, like everything was for nothing!As if you never left that room!And you’re still there, still trembling, still sobbing, still feeling forever helpless, even though your brother is back now, is whole now, is here!But he’s not fucking here!”His taut hands spasming freely now, Ed stumbled, collapsing onto the ground into a heap.He began to rock turbulently, his entire body wracked as he cried freely.

Winry’s gaze soften, and she knelt by the broken, former alchemist, who suddenly seemed much younger and much smaller than he was, his vacant exterior removed.She reached out, her movement solid and certain, rage reforming into something different.Into determination.If there was one thing Winry Rockbell was, it was stubborn.She latched onto to Ed’s shoulder, halting his motions.“Look at me,” she commanded, the tone surprisingly smooth and compassionate.Growing steady, Ed looked to her as he righted himself into a sitting position.Her words were measured, exact, consistent in pace.“Things never just end.Nothing disappears.It’s always there, no matter what you do.We keep on living.And we live with it.We learn to coexist inside ourselves, with whatever it is that hangs around in our minds.We learn to share that space, without giving it up.We learn to persist.You think I don’t still think of my parents?You think that pain just magically vanished one day?It’s still there.And it always will be.But it got better.I accepted it, as much as I could.I let it be a part of me.I didn’t let it force me out of myself.”

“This . . . won’t . . . go away,” Ed mumbled, cracking out the words.“It’s there waiting for me . . . even now.It’ll be there.I can’t live with it . . . it won’t let me.It’s either it or me.”His eyes were unseeing, totally intent on the invisible, the intangible.

“Ed, sometimes . . .”Winry sighed, searching for words.“You can’t win on your own.Nothing we did, none of the battles we fought, were us on our own.That’s what made us powerful.We all fought together, even if we all fought in our own way.You’ve . . . never told anyone, have you?About any of this.”

Ed coughed roughly, his lungs protesting his emotion’s physical toil on his body.“Would’ve . . . told Al,” he stuttered.

Winry slipped her hands into her husband’s now-sandy hair.“You know, for all your talk of being someone who handles his own problems, I think you were a lot more dependent on your brother than you realize.Or at least want to admit.”

Ed coughed again, the thought seeming to provoke his body’s ire.He inhaled deeply, and spoke again, quietly.“Don’t say that.He’s my little brother.It was always my job to take care of him, not the other way around.”

“I think he did more to take care of you than give him credit for,” Winry remarked softly, slipping a hand into husband’s grip, and interweaving their fingers.He returned the action slowly, clasping them together.“And don’t talk about your brother in the past tense.Just because he’s in Xing now doesn’t mean he’s not alive or something.”

This seemed to dispel Ed’s trancelike state.His eyes found the ground, looking ashamed.“Yeah . . . you’re right.”

“Why didn’t you let anyone else in?Just because your brother isn’t here anymore, to help you through things, doesn’t mean that no one else can.Mustang would have jumped at the chance to actual feel like you wanted to have a heart-to-heart with him.I mean, the man basically wishes he was your dad, whether he’s willing to admit it or not.Hell, when it comes to trauma, I’m pretty sure Hawkeye could give you some pretty good advice.And she’d probably be more than willing to talk to you Ed.And oh, I dunno, maybe just maybe, your wife, the woman who you asked to give you half of her life in exchange for half of yours, might want to talk to you about stuff.She might want to stay up with you every night you can’t sleep and hold your hand tight enough that it can’t twitch.We love you Ed.I love you.”Exhaling gradually, Winry bent down, and laid a kiss on the top of Ed’s head, letting her lips brush the particulate-laced locks of now-unruly golden filaments.

Ed’s tears had only increased their outpouring, an untapped reservoir near-full to bursting finally drilled.“I . . . didn’t want to be the one . . . who was weak . . . who was the burden everyone else had to carry.I couldn’t be the weak one.I couldn’t be the weak one.”

“Edward Elric, everyone’s carried by someone else.We all carry each other.And I don’t know the details, but I guarantee you the entire military gang, they’ve all been holding each other up.And they always will be.Humans take shelter in the refuge of the loved ones that surround them.That’s what makes us strong, makes us resilient, lets us endure.We aren’t solitary survivors, lone hunters.We’re all in this crazy, fucked-up ride of life together.We might as well have some good company along the way.Do you understand?”

Ed lifted his head once again, slowly nodding.

“I swear, communicating with you has got to be more difficult than saving the world sometimes.I’ll ask Al the next time I see him.I guarantee you, he’ll back me up there.”

Ed chuckled ruefully, the sound mixing strangely with his raspy breathing and muted weeping.“I’m an idiot like that,” he intoned weakly.

“No,” Winry disagreed.“You’re just stubborn as all hell.But so am I.”She paused, weighing whether to voice her next thoughts or not.The temptation to do so was eventually too great for her to resist.“And I bet they will be too.So, I guess we better get our acts together soon rather than later, because I get the feeling we’re gonna need to be allies when it comes to laying down some sense of order.”

Ed looked at her, confusion mixing in with his melancholy.“Did I miss something?”He asked as his crying diminished to an ongoing stream of silent tears.

Winry shook her head.“Not yet you haven’t.But unless things change, you might miss a lot.But I’m not going to let that happen.”She guided the hand that was interwoven with hers to rest on her belly.Ed looked at her uncertainly.

“What do you mean? . . .”

Winry rolled her eyes, trying not to smile in spite of her still-very-much-mixed emotions.“You’re pretty damn dense sometimes, you know that, right?I said I wanted to come out here for a reason, and I meant it.I wanted to tell you.That I’m pregnant.”Winry could help but be more than a bit impressed at the abrupt transformation that came over Edward.At first, his mouth went limp, his jaw hanging loosely as he looked at her, dumbfounded.She raised an eyebrow, which seemed to burst his awestruck bubble.A second, more drastic alteration crept over his face.His features intensified, a sudden warmth and power filling them, displayed in tandem with the tears which continue to run down his cheeks.He gazed piercingly at where his hand was laid.He could feel an unexpected curvature there now, that he hadn’t noticed until his attention was called to it.

“How long . . . how long have you known?I mean . . . how far along . . . ?”He trailed off, allowing the question to rest between them.

“I’ve suspected for a couple months.I got it confirmed a few days before we left.I don’t really know how far along I am.But, if I had to make a guess, I’d say it probably happened sometime after you came back from your last trip to Aerugo.It was the first time in a while that we . . .”She mimicked Ed and trailed off, letting the statement hang suggestively in the air.She thought she could make out a hint of a blush tinting Ed’s face in addition to the flush brought on by his emotional maelstrom that had was still resolving.

Ed’s eyes shot upward to reconnect with Winry’s.He extended his free hand to wrap about Winry’s back, and pulled himself in close to her.“Winry,” he began, his voice laden with a newborn conviction.“I’m going to change.For you.For them.”He caressed her belly with an increasing wonder.“Cross my heart and hope to die.I need help.But I won’t stay hidden.I’ll stop running.I’ll stop it.All of it.”His confidence faltered and his voice choked as he uttered the final part of his declaration.“I won’t be, I can’t be him.”

Winry replied to this with a single question.“Can’t be who?”

“My father . . .”The words came haltingly.

Her response to this was swift and resolute.“You won’t be.”

“I don’t want to—“

“You won’t be.”The silence that followed her words spoke volumes, of her assurance, and his tumult.He nodded after several still moments, the gesture anxious but hopeful.She spoke again, the same statement echoed a third time.“You won’t be.”The silence was ponderous as the darkness continued to extend its clutches over the waterfront.She broke it with a practical observation.“Let’s go back while we can still see the path in front of us.”Ed quickly nodded in agreement to this, at last returning to the environment around him.In surprising synchrony, they rose, pulling away from each other only as much as necessary.Their hands remained interlinked as they stood.Winry craned her neck about in the accumulating shade, peering about the beach keenly.“Now . . . where did my sandals get to?”

Ed shrugged, satisfied with his silence.

**Author's Note:**

> So, for all of my TTWS fans who are reading this (looks out over an empty arena), did you catch all of the wonderful Sprockety easter eggs? Not sure what I just said there, but we're going with it. If so, leave a comment below and don't forget to smash that like button—dammit, wrong platform. Anyway, the comment thing still stands! I'm expecting none, so prove me wrong!


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